Question

I am using JSF 2.0 and RichFaces 4. For the date input, I am trying to force the pattern mm/dd/yyyy.

<h:inputText value="#{bean.startDate}">
    <f:convertDateTime pattern="mm/dd/yyyy"/>
</h:inputText>

When user actually enters a date with a 2-digit year like so mm/dd/yy, then the converter automatically converts the year to 4 digits. This is undesired. How can I stop it from doing that without creating a custom converter? Is this a bug in the JSF converter?

Answer 1

This isn’t a bug. That’s just how SimpleDateFormat works. Here’s a cite of relevance from the linked javadoc:

• Year: If the formatter’s Calendar is the Gregorian calendar, the following rules are applied.
  • …
  • For parsing, if the number of pattern letters is more than 2, the year is interpreted literally, regardless of the number of digits. So using the pattern “MM/dd/yyyy”, “01/11/12” parses to Jan 11, 12 A.D.
  • …

The JSF <f:convertDateTime> is just using it under the covers. Your best bet is to extend the DateTimeConverter and validate the length of the submitted value before passing through to the real DateTimeConverter. You can’t go around creating a custom converter, but it’s after all fairly simple.

@FacesConverter("myDateTimeConverter")
public class MyDateTimeConverter extends DateTimeConverter {

    public MyDateTimeConverter() {
        setPattern("MM/dd/yyyy");
    }

    @Override
    public Object getAsObject(FacesContext context, UIComponent component, String value) {
        if (value != null && value.length() != getPattern().length()) {
            throw new ConverterException("Invalid format");
        }
        return super.getAsObject(context, component, value);
    }

}

Use it as follows:

<h:inputText ... converterMessage="Please enter date in MM/dd/yyyy format">
    <f:converter converterId="myDateTimeConverter" />
</h:inputText>

Please note that I fixed the mm (minutes) in the pattern to be MM (months).